Shut Up, Dude: This Week’s Best Comments

TV on the Radio will be releasing a new album in 2024. Source: trust me bro.

Sorry to be a Scrooge, but "We Are Young" has always irritated the crap out of me. It's obvious the song's built around this big anthemic chorus that's meant for festival shout-alongs, which is ok on it own. But the verses just don't mesh with the overall jive. It's like I'm watching a CW show with kids moping about life and are half my age, then someone comes in, changes the channel on me to some History Channel documentary about military fighter jets, only to turn it back to the mopey CW kids as soon as I get interested in the fighter jets, and I just throw my hands up and go, WTF, make up your mind already.

Now, learning for the first time in 11 years Janelle Monae is 'featured' on this song disgusts me even more. I had no idea, zero, nada, none, that she appeared on the song. Watching the video explained why - the lines she sings are so buried in the mix, and Nate Ruess' bleating is stomping all over her part. I have never noticed her part before today. Never even considered it to be a female back up singer, I mean, those lines do not stand out at all, it's all Nate's nasally screaming, that's all I hear. For shame; Janelle deserves better.

I may be a tad influenced by the fact I have a total medical waiver induced nails on chalkboard shudder response to Nate's voice. Pass. Pass, pass, pass.

We're full on in the era of Fall Out Panic Fun supergroup confusion. I totally fell into old people mode at this time, not being able to tell any of these emo rock groups apart and being all cranky old woman about it. 😆

Maybe if I was 21 when this song came out, I probably would have embraced it more readily. But this song just bugged me as a 38 year old. And I had no newborns making it into a cute experience to hear the song and share a moment with them (very cute memory Tom, and I like how it's become a road trip tradition for you guys - so awesome!).

4/10.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, however you celebrate this time of year, to our wonderful merry band of music lovers here in TNOCS. 🤗

Merry Christmas Stereogum! Merry Christmas TNOCS!

Not to be a grinch about it, but unfortunately I cannot stand this song. If it comes on the radio, it’s an instant lunge for the dial. The song seems to only exist as a vehicle to deliver the chorus, and the chorus’ wounded wailing intensity grates like nails on a chalkboard to me. It’s a 2, only because I like Janelle Monae… boosting it a point for residual good feeling.

Tried pitching this here and about a half-dozen other outlets who never responded, but myself and my friend Kelechi Ehenulo decided to go and write it for a blog anyway.Here's a list of what we think were the Top 10 Needle-Drops in Film & TV of 2013!Had fun working on the piece, so please give it a read and share!What were your personal favourites? https://setthetape.com/2023/12/22/the-10-best-needle-drops-of-2023/

And then there was Frank's ice skating rink.

There really is a strong puritanical or sex negative streak running though culture right now in a way that attempts to rob people of their sexual agency or shame people for their desires. I strikes me as a something that’s arisen post me too, where some folks would rather erase aspects of sex and desire rather than reckon with the inherent complexity that exists there.

Decades later that baby is still chasing that dollar

I present to you, Stereogum Commenters' 50 Best Songs of 2023. A couple notes about methodology and findings, as well as the Spotify playlist, are below the list.

01. Olivia Rodrigo: "bad idea right?" (160, 12)

02. Ratboys: "The Window" (128, 10)

03. Militarie Gun: "Do It Faster" (115, 9)

04. Ratboys: "Black Earth, WI" (93, 6)

05. boygenius: "Not Strong Enough" (82, 7)

06. Sufjan Stevens: "Shit Talk" (81, 6)

07. Wednesday: "Chosen to Deserve" (80, 9)

08. Lana Del Rey: "A&W" (80, 6)

09. Big Thief: "Vampire Empire" (76, 8)

10. MJ Lenderman: "Knockin" (64, 6)

11. NewJeans: "Super Shy" (62, 6)

12. Blur: "The Narcissist" (62, 5)

13. Carly Rae Jepsen: "Psychedelic Switch" (56, 5)

14. Mannequin Pussy: "I Got Heaven" (56, 5)

15. Sufjan Stevens: "Will Anybody Ever Love Me?" (55, 4)

16. Chris Farren: "Cosmic Leash" (53, 5)

17. Wednesday: "Bath County" (49, 3)

18. MSPAINT: "Delete It (ft. Militarie Gun)" (49, 3)

19. The National: "Space Invader" (48, 5)

20. jaimie branch: "the mountain" (48, 4)

21. ANOHNI and The Johnsons: "It Must Change" (48, 3)

22. Troye Sivan: "Rush" (45, 4)

23. MJ Lenderman: "Rudolph" (42, 4)

24. Nourished by Time: "Daddy" (42, 4)

25. Kylie Minogue: "Padam Padam" (41, 4)

26. DEBBY FRIDAY: "So Hard to Tell" (40, 4)

27. Mitski: "My Love Mine All Mine" (40, 3)

28. Indigo De Souza: "Younger & Dumber" (40, 3)

29. Rancid: "Tomorrow Never Comes" (40, 3)

30. Car Colors: "Old Death" (40, 2)

31. boygenius: "Satanist" (38, 4)

32. Young Fathers: "I Saw" (36, 4)

33. Slowdive: "kisses" (36, 3)

34. Amaarae: "Co-Star" (36, 3)

35. Ratboys: "Morning Zoo" (36, 3)

36. JPEGMAFIA & Danny Brown: "Kingdom Hearts Key (ft. redveil)" (33, 3)

37. Drug Church: "Myopic" (33, 3)

38. Militarie Gun: "Very High" (32, 3)

39. 100 gecs: "Frog on the Floor" (32, 3)

40. yeule: "dazies" (32, 3)

41. Sofia Kourtesis: "Vajkoczy" (32, 3)

42. Everything But The Girl: "Nothing Left to Lose" (32, 3)

43. Grian Chatten: "Fairlies" (32, 3)

44. Strange Ranger: "She's on Fire" (32, 3)

45. Yard Act: "The Trench Coat Museum" (32, 3)

46. Jessie Ware: "Free Yourself" (32, 2)

47. Sadness: "Lowsun in a Glistening" (32, 2)

48. Hotline TNT: "I Thought You'd Change" (31, 4)

49. Home Is Where: "yes! yes! a thousand times yes!" (30, 3)

50. Jessie Ware: "Begin Again" (29, 2)

- This was compiled from everyone's lists in the comments of Stereogum's best songs post.

- In the parentheses, the first number indicates how many points the song received (I won't go into all the details, but just so you get a sense of the scale I used, 1st-place votes received 20 points, 2nd-place votes received 17 points, 3rd-place got 14 points, other top 10 placements got 12 points, etc.). The second number in the parentheses is how many total appearances the song made across everyone's lists.

- Six songs had more than one 1st-place vote: "bad idea right?" (4), "Black Earth, WI" (3), "Shit Talk" (2), "It Must Change" (2), & "Old Death" (2 appearances total, both of which were 1st-place votes).

- I added up each artist's total points. Here were the highest ranked artists with no songs in the top 50, mostly because they had so many distinct songs receiving votes without any clear consensus: Yves Tumor (8th highest ranked artist), Paramore (19th), Caroline Polachek (27th), Jeff Rosenstock (28th), Fever Ray (30th), Julie Byrne (32nd), Fireworks (34th), Bully (35th).

- Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1Y5LbhS7ECpYdrzVxbq9U2?si=876bf029fa2c4c9e

The Rolling Stones/Sweeney things was the only take I thought was a off-base. As ridiculous as it is for men who are somehow still making music at 130 years old, sex in rock has always been part of their brand. It's also incredibly tame by today's standard (see every other music video by a pop star this year). She dressed like every single woman I've seen at a dance club and, compared to a rave/EDM festival she was dressed like a librarian. Lastly, she didn't even have to interact with the band (it would have definitely been gross if she was playing Mick's love interest in the video or something.) It's a strangely puritanical take in an era where sex is sold to you 24 hours a day.

No Egrets